“When you are entering a roundabout, you are looking to see if any cars are coming,” she

said. “You are not seeing pedestrians, especially children. They will have to play ‘Frogger’ to get across.”

One resident touched on the difficulty of navigating roundabouts in a vehicle.

“There is no roundabout school on how to drive in a roundabout,” said Val Manley. “I feel much safer with a red light.”

Resident Kathy Fitzmann brought up the fact that if the roundabouts were built, residents would be expected to contribute 20 percent of the cost.

“If we have to pay 20 percent for the project, we should have 20 percent input,” she said.

Mark Spataro perhaps summed up the feelings of the most speakers best.

“You are asking drivers and pedestrians to make difficult decisions,” he said. “Roundabouts are a system that rewards movement that almost borders on aggression.”

The Round Lake Road Corridor has been growing by leaps and bounds. With the addition of several new businesses, including a Hannaford Supermarket, Malta officials have been looking at ways to address growing congestion and traffic problems. In order to prepare for the planned renovations, The Town Board formed the Round Lake Road Corridor Advisory Committee in April of 2011. The committee recommended a study be conducted of the corridor to determine what improvements were needed. In October of 2011, the town hired the Chazen Companies at a cost of $36,000 to do a study of the corridor and make recommendations.

The resulting Round Lake Corridor Plan includes upgrades to six intersections, including the two roundabouts, along Round Lake Road and would take $4.75 to implement. That cost would be mitigated by a federal highway grant the town recently received that will cover 80 percent of the cost.

Have you checked out where most pedestrian crashes are happening in your city? Probably at traffic signals. It's easy to stop for pedestrians and avoid crashes at the 20 mph a modern roundabout operates at.